In commercial fiction the glossy twenty-something characters of chick lit are being joined by more realistic middle-aged heroines whose experiences of life and love are often more complicated and affecting.

She knows what she likes and she knows how to find it, and the whole debate over what constitutes chick lit and whether any of it's any good does not matter to her at all.

Its dark content and fast tempo steer it away from the sickly sweet clichés of chick lit, yet it provides brief and self-indulgent escapism, infusing Hollywood glamour with an edgy cynicism.

The number of new chick lit titles a year rocking out of bookstores suggests that escapist girly action is the women's self-help health group of the 21st century.

In a lot of chick lit, depicting women slightly older than me, the sexual maturity is that of a nine-year-old.

The women in non-fiction chick lit possess all the cartoonish and exaggerated qualities of chick-lit heroines, and none of the complexity of real women.

Her main character loves designer clothes and jewelry, as the title suggests, but Kennedy sets the novel in the world of hip-hop, and it has a far grittier feel than your usual pink-covered chick lit.